Retaking Rationality

4.11 - 1251 ratings - Source

That America's natural environment has been degraded and despoiled over the past 25 years is beyond dispute. Nor has there been any shortage of reasons why - short-sighted politicians, a society built on overconsumption, and the dramatic weakening of environmental regulations. In Retaking Rationality, Richard Revesz and Michael Livermore argue convincingly that one of the least understood - and most important - causes of our failure to protect the environment has been a misguided rejection of reason. The authors show that environmentalists, labor unions, and other progressive groups have declined to participate in the key governmental proceedings concerning the cost-benefit analysis of federal regulations. They have opted instead for the moral high ground, preferring to criticize the technique - as being inherently unfair and heartless - rather than to engage in its development. As a result of this vacuum, industry groups have captured cost-benefit analysis and used it to further their anti-regulatory ends. Beginning in 1981, the federal Office of Management and Budget and the federal courts have used cost-benefit analysis extensively to determine which environmental, health, and safety regulations are approved and which are sent back to the drawing board. The resulting imbalance in political participation has profoundly affected the nation's regulatory and legal landscape. But Revesz and Livermore contend that economic analysis of regulations is necessary andthat it needn't conflict with - and can in fact support - a more compassionate approach to environmental policy. Indeed, they show that we cannot give up on rationality if we truly want to protect our natural environment. Retaking Rationality makes clear that by embracing and reforming cost-benefit analysis, and by joining reason and compassion, progressive groups can help enact strong environmental and public health regulation.350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360 361 362 363 Valdez Convention
aamp; Visitors Bureau, A Short History of Valdez, http:// www.valdezalaskaorg/history/
shortHistoryVa1dez.html (last visited Nov. 20, 2007). ... See THE NATURE
CONSERVANCY, CONSOLIDATED FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (2006) available
at http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/atfinancials2006.pdf. See
Carsonanbsp;...

Title

:

Retaking Rationality

Author

:

Richard L. Revesz, Michael A. Livermore

Publisher

:

Oxford University Press, USA - 2008

ISBN-13

:

You must register with us as either a Registered User before you can Download this Book. You'll be greeted by a simple sign-up page.

Once you have finished the sign-up process, you will be redirected to your download Book page.